We at Arlo & Janis do not think hitting a cat in the head with a door is funny. In our defense, this one just sort of slipped by quality control. In fact, we think physical humor is disgusting, and we are very excited to be present at the dawn of a glorious era, the digital production of comics. In the future, when every panel is a cut-and-paste copy of the initial panel, with only the dialog—and maybe an eyebrow—changing from start to finish, physical humor in the comics will become all but impossible and will disappear from our consciousness altogether. We live for that day.
185 responses to “Cat Fall”
Please, JJ, tell us you’re being facetious here! After all, pratfalls are the source of all good humor… without it, we wouldn’t have Mr Laurel and Mr Hardy.
Actually, I love how you put the actual violence “off camera” and left it up to our imaginations. The reaction shot is what’s funny! Our cats, in such a circumstance, wouldn’t be in such a hilarious position; they’d still be standing and looking up at me like the whole thing was my fault — get out of the way, human!
In fact, if cats could figure out how to open the cat food, they would wait until we were out of the house and then have all the locks changed. But still, they are way ahead of dogs. How does it go? Dogs have owners, cats have staff.
Here’s a story I think Jackie might like: http://www.al.com/living/index.ssf/2017/02/fannie_flagg_on_the_alabama_me.html#incart_river_home
And the humor in the retro strip is the setup from Arlo, indicating that this isn’t the first time it’s happened. Once would not be funny. Repeating the same action when you know what will go wrong is.
Jimmy, I think dogs are faster learners, particularly where food is concerned. For some reason, I think that’s a pantry door Luddy is fixated on.
Trapper Jean, how is recovery going? (After Jackie’s party, maybe I should ask her the same thing. 😉 )
One of my cats likes to lay right in front of the big screen with his paw dangling over the edge. The other day I was looking for a DVD and when I closed the door of the cabinet, the cat’s paw got caught. He uttered an almost human cry that was at the same time, comical and sad. He hopped downstairs but quickly was racing around the house like nothing happened.
I might have mentioned this on an earlier thread, but I had to change the way that I view my comics and it looks like the site is linked to the “Dark Side”. Wow, some the people there are awful. It really makes you wonder why they wasted their time to comment, except that they probably do not have much in their lives to do but made disparaging comments online. Thankful for this group.
My cats play musical doors. They have gotten tails broken. Paws caught. Doors closed on them. They change their minds on you and fast.
actually, there IS a comic just like that now! it’s called “Dinosaur Comics”, is present on GoComics, and is absolutely horrible! (at least to the old fashioned like me!).
I once had a cat who’d learned how to pull the front door open from the inside, although she still needed me for the screen. One day she tried the same trick on the bathroom door and almost got caught because it opened into the room and she was out in the hall, pulling it shut. I don’t think she ever figured out that what she needed there was to push it with her head.
Alf was actually not a mackerel tabby but a prince trapped in a 24 pound cat. He was totally not cat like. He opened doors and cabinets with his paws despite being declawed by who ever took him to shelter.
I grieve for him as does my daughter who has his ashes.
Ah, yes, the precipitous decline of the popularity of physical humor. Any day I expect to hear that Wile E. Coyote has retained legal counsel and has had charges filed against Roadrunner for felonious assault, endangering a member of a non-endangered species, and conspiracy to commit mopery, as well as a product liability lawsuit against The Acme Company, alleging numerous cases of faulty product design.
Ghostly Retribution: A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me in kickboxing.
Ghost, +
Looked up mopery and found this:
‘The word mopery has been used by authors Thomas Pynchon (Gravity’s Rainbow) and Dashiell Hammett (The Thin Man), among others, for whom it is usually a comic accent. In Catch 22 (Joseph Heller, 1961), the mildly rebellious Cadet Clevinger is court-martialed by three angry officers, who accuse him of “breaking ranks while in formation, felonious assault, indiscriminate behavior, mopery, high treason, provoking, being a smart-guy, listening to classical music, and so on”. Similarly, in the 1984 comedy film, Revenge of the Nerds, mopery is defined as “exposing oneself to a blind person.”[1] According to Russell Baker, “mopery isn’t a crime, but only an old policemen’s joke in which it’s defined as the act of displaying yourself in the nude to a blind person.”[2]’
Listening to classical music. Guess I got off easy. I’m sure I knew officers who would have considered that suspicious, if not felonious.
Reminds me of the joke/true? story re the piano tuner. Think that’s been by here once or 2x. Peace,
Debbe Sends Love. She misses us all so much . She is still at her dad’s and will probably get on loving there. She misses posting and reading us. Expecially Ghost. And the music. She asked me to post Reba McIntyre new song. Saif it had God in title.
I loved up title and half of songs had God in title. The rest had Jesus. It is religious albums!
Tell Debbe that Gomer say Hey! err Steve says Hey
If anyone knows the new Reba McIntyre album post the song you think Debbe means.
I am calling her in few minutes.
Don’t forget the housewife who opened her door to the “blind” man who had come to install her new window treatment.
Debbe probably meant this one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9q-08aTNh8
Back to God
Jackie:
I hope when you are driving “Topless” you have Dickens in a restraint.
Don’t want him chasing squirrels when you are doing 70.
Or bet ejected if you are rear-ended.
BTW we had – #s this AM got to plus 11 this afternoon.
GM Debbe where ever you are 😉
Good morning all. And maybe good night. Dickens isn’t having any of this getting up!
From today’s ‘Writer’s Almanac’:
Behan, Brendan wrote his first play, The Quare Fellow (1956), / the execution of a convict in a Dublin prison. When he got out of prison, it ? big hit / London & then New York. He followed that up w/ novel Borstal Boy (1958) & The Hostage (1958), in which he wrote:
Never throw stones at your mother, / You’ll be sorry for it when she’s dead, / Never throw stones at your mother, / Throw bricks at your father instead. Wr.A.170209
Peace,
Cor, the kids these days! Can’t take physical humor, unlike the golden years of the Katzenjammer Kids!
But now that I think about it, in KK the humor was in the anticipation, not the violence itself, and JJ gets that part right in this strip.
Hugs to Debbe and everyone else who might need them. And even if you don’t. Just because.
Thanks, Li’l Smigz. One thing I can always use is a good hug. For some reason, I seem to get a lot of them from women. Lucky me!
9 Chickweed Lane has taken an interesting turn.
http://www.gocomics.com/9chickweedlane
Just began following it. The trio w/ backs to us has just canoed ashore on this island. No idea of the back story.
Brooke has not updated Pibgorn, the web-only strip, for some weeks.
Peace